Posts

Higher Awareness as Effect or Goal

In the past weeks I wrote a couple of articles making a distinction between Truth and Its effects and highlighting the importance of seeking Truth rather than Its effects.   This came up for me upon reading Jan Frazier’s When Fear Falls Away , which emphasized an awareness of inner Divinity as a goal for humanity without any discussion of the Source of that Divinity. I felt the lack of that discussion was curious and somehow incongruent with my experience. I was reminded of Joel Goldsmith’s Infinite Way, which was a help to me early on my path, but also never discussed Truth and illusion. Frazier seems to say her ego-less perception is humanity’s potential; Goldsmith seemed to say the egoic view was erroneous and the ego-less view is “God’s creation”.             It’s taken me a while to sort out what I read and felt was incongruent with my experience. It comes down to this: My experiences of direct Revelation (Truth Itself...

Getting to Know Me, Getting to Know All About Me...

            Last week I mentioned having thoroughly reviewed the ego (personal thought system) in this mind and my relationship to it over the past several months. There is nothing new to learn, but the review continues. It is as though the echo of the ego is falling away in slow motion and as it falls the Light shines through it and I see, in minute detail, what it was and how I related to it. While it is a thought system of fear, I no longer fear it. Getting to know my mind like this is the most intimate experience I have ever had. It is also empowering. No illusions about what’s going on here. It’s right in my face, moment by moment. There’s no other power here. This is between me and me, and nothing else, which is why it feels so intimate. I have felt that the ego is gone in all but my conscious awareness. My conscious awareness is where I live moment by moment. Sometimes I’m in the Awareness of Truth and I feel the echo hovering in the distanc...

Resistance, Obstacles, and Timing

The moment the idea of the opposite-of-Truth (God) arose it was undone by Truth’s all-encompassing nature. But within that idea is time, and in time it seems like the idea arose long ago and will be undone in some indefinite future. So what we experience unfolding as the story of spacetime is the Undoing of the idea of not-Truth (the “Atonement” in A Course in Miracles ). That means everything that occurs is part of the Undoing. Some things are obviously a part of it, as in each time Truth breaks into a mind, however briefly. I refer to this as the “manifest Undoing” and those who are conscious of Truth the “manifest undoers”. But everyone else is also playing their part perfectly. They are the “support players” as it were. They are just as necessary to the undoing as the manifest undoers.             As I have come to understand this, I have become aware that everything happens in the perfect time. Resistance and obstacles in s...

Ask: Who is the "I" in the affirmations of your 4HIP book?

“ Liz in your book the ‘4 Habits for Inner Peace’ you state at the beginning of each chapter on the four habits an affirmation that contains the word ‘I’. Who is the ‘I’ that is making these affirmations?...” – E St. A             Well, since you’re reading the book, hopefully you! You, the mind asking the question. You, the mind that is seeking an experience other than the one you have had. You, the mind that wants to remember What it is in Truth.             I suspect that behind your question is your wondering where your mind fits into the whole Truth and illusion thing. Or maybe the different levels of mind, blah, blah, blah. You don’t have to question this. You don’t have to doubt yourself or your experience of yourself. Just have the experience you’re having without judging it or trying to understand how it fits in to a bunch of theories. You are you, a mind seeki...

Detachment

Have no illusions—when you are uncomfortable thinking about the detachment that comes with the awareness of Truth, it’s not because you will come across as cold and unfeeling. It’s not because you will abandon your loved ones or lose them in some way. This is what the ego (personal thought system) tells you to distract you from what’s really going on. Your discomfort is because when you detach what you really detach from is not some world outside you, but from the ego (personal thought system) and its “world” (perceptions).             Detachment from the ego is the natural result of being aware of Truth. You experience it at first as not feeling as you are used to about a certain person or situation. “This used to really upset me. It doesn’t anymore.” It seems as though it is the situation you are detached from, but it is actually that you are no longer responding to it from the ego. You’ve chosen to look at it from a different...

Seek Truth, Not Its Effects

A few weeks ago I wrote about Truth and Its effects and not confusing them. What inspired that article was my reading of Jan Frazier's book, When Fear Falls Away .   While the book was directly useful to me by validating my experience and helping me to delineate the distinction between psychological wholeness and spiritual Wholeness, I felt something was missing from her story. And that was Truth Itself. This is what reminded me to turn inward to Truth. And, as it always does, this caused important shifts for me.             I first wrote about this in March, 2017, after I’d realized, with great relief, that love and peace, and joy were only effects. Like everyone I chased these, but chasing them misses the point. Truth is the point, not Its effects. They are important because they indicate Truth is here, but to seek them for themselves is to lose sight of Truth.          ...

The Shift in "I"

My experience of “I” has changed. I no longer experience my motivations and actions as coming from a limited, personal, autonomous place. I used to feel “I” was an independent thread in a tapestry of other independent threads. Now I experience “I” as the Tapestry expressing Itself through this thread. A Course in Miracles says you cannot know What you are in yourself alone. This means you cannot understand yourself as only one thread in the Tapestry. You are the Tapestry as a whole expressing as a single thread. ACIM speaks in terms of your relationships with others, but, for me, even the way I read that for a long time was limiting. Not yet able to allow the Tapestry to express through me, I tried to understand the Tapestry one thread (relationship) at a time, and it didn’t work. I was relating at the level of the thread rather than at the level of the Tapestry. The mystical Holy Relationship with another has been my way into understanding this. A mystical Holy Relationship i...

The Difference Between Psychological and Spiritual Wholeness

Psychological wholeness is not the same as the awareness of inherent Wholeness that is the Awareness of Truth (Holy Spirit/Christ Consciousness). Psychological wholeness results when, through life experience and/or spiritual awareness, you realize that you will be okay no matter what happens. You are aware of your inner strength, be it personal or your awareness of Truth, and you realize you can survive anything. On a worldly level, this is no small thing. It’s a lovely awareness to have in that context. But it is not the Wholeness of the Awareness of Truth. To be in an Awareness of Truth is to be in an entirely different state of mind. It is a state of Abundant Wholeness, or Love. There simply is no lack in the Awareness of Truth. It is an unshakable state. You know it to reflect Truth, so it remains the same no matter what is happening in your life, to those closest to you, and to the world around you. You see that others feel that they are in lack all the time, even when they do...

Truth Rising to Conscious Awareness

I recently read Jan Frazier’s, “When Fear Falls Away”. She asked for fear to be removed and woke up the next morning to find the ego (personal thought system) gone. Then she went on to write about the effects of this and all that it taught her about her mind before and after. Reading her experience validated mine, and though my experience is unfolding in a very different way, her story has helped me to understand mine better. I didn’t have a sudden awakening where I consciously recognized what had happened. In fact, some of what she realized after her sudden shift in awareness I have realized slowly over the past few years. For me, the experience of the ego (personal thought system) falling away has been a slow dawning on my conscious mind that this has occurred. It is as if, when it comes to my conscious awareness, what she realized suddenly has been dawning in slow motion. I’ve only realized in the past few months how new things are in this mind and for how long they have bee...

Truth, the Awareness of Truth, and Its Effects

Lately, I have been pulled back inward to the Awareness of Truth (Holy Spirit). I’ve certainly been experiencing It a great deal spontaneously, but this pull inward is something different. It seems to be coming from a conscious recognition of the difference between Truth, the Awareness of Truth, and Its effects. It began with experiencing again Truth’s complete indifference to the experience of not-Truth. Contemplating this I became aware how caught up I’ve been in what are merely the effects of the awareness of Truth. Frankly, my life has transformed so greatly I had to be. The transformation began with the experience I call The Golden, when the Golden Light of Love came into my mind and brought a romance novel with It. During that time, I also reached a point where I recognized that the Light Itself and the love and joy that accompanied It, were really only effects of being aware of Truth. They were not Truth, nor were they the Awareness of Truth, and I didn’t want to lose sight ...

Ask: What does the Course mean by "ideas leave not their source"?

“…What does the Course mean when it says: ideas leave not their source? I just can’t seem to get a true understanding of that.” LDP “Ideas leave not their source, and their effects but seem to be apart from them. Ideas are of the mind. What is projected out, and seems to be external to the mind, is not outside at all, but an effect of what is in, and has not left its source.” (T-26.VII.4) “There is no world apart from your ideas because ideas leave not their source, and you maintain the world within your mind in thought.” (W-132.10) Your experience of peace or conflict is the effect of thoughts (beliefs) in your mind. You may project the source of your experience outward and feel that someone or something else has caused your experience, but that does not make it so. Your “world” (experience) has its source in your thoughts (beliefs, perceptions), which never actually leave you when you deny them by projecting them away. For example, let’s say a friend has treated...

Ask: Why doesn't Truth hold our attention?

“ Aldous Huxley wrote ‘Distraction is the original sin of the mind’. Distraction appears to be the ego’s most valued weapon in the world with a vast arsenal and growing steadily. So then it seems that it’s what you give your attention to that will determine the level of inner peace or chaos in your experience in the world. This Distraction/Attention dynamic seems to me to be at the core of Truth/not Truth discovery within. While in this dualistic drama not-Truth claims easy victories distracting personal selves through attention and distraction, Truth on the other hand stands silently and waits for our mighty power of attention to turn towards it. It’s as if Truth knows you will ultimately come back to it. The sound and fury of the ego has no effect on it but it does on you. Why doesn’t Truth pull our attention?” – E St. A Make no mistake: Not-Truth (including the ego/personal thought system) has no power over you. You empower it by valuing it. Truth doesn’t hold your attent...

Life As Spirit (so far)

Whenever I express to others a dramatic shift in my experience I am asked to describe how life is different from the way it was before the shift. Of course I have been asked this since I have shared with others that this mind has attained the ongoing awareness that I am Spirit. Life goes on as usual for the self (body/personality) on the outside. Well, as usual for living in the countryside in south Western Australia, which is wholly unlike the life I lived in a desert city in the southwestern US just a few weeks ago! But I mean the self appears as usual like a person, doing what people normally do every day, and I am experienced as a person by others. The dramatic difference is within. I live so wholly in the moment. I call this experience Hereness . (It could also be called the “Spaciousness” I have referred to before. Or just being wholly present, centered, or in Presence). I am like an island in the stream of time, around which time flows. I am often staring out windows ...

The Fact of Spirit

It is not appropriate to exalt or to worship Spirit or anyone who has attained the awareness of Spirit. Of course, when you identify with the self and ego (personal thought system), Spirit seems “other”. It can seem remote, mysterious, and/or magical. It is none of these things. It is What is Real in you, It is always right here and available, and It is miraculous, meaning It is simply True. It is the ego that tells you to exalt and worship Spirit to make Spirit seem foreign, exotic, and unobtainable. And to diminish you. A couple of months ago I experienced myself as Spirit for the first time. I was actually crouched down cleaning the shower door in my former house when it occurred. I don’t remember what I was thinking before the experience. But suddenly I knew I have no beginning and no end. I am Invulnerable; I am Immortal. I am Spirit. Even when I act as a person, I am Spirit. I have had many higher miracles that have shown me the Truth is true or that illusion is il...

Ask: Can you interpret "all things work together for good"?

“ Please interpret this phrase from the text 4:V:1: ‘All things work together for good. There are no exceptions except in the ego's judgment.’ In the ego-world/battlefield it hardly seems possible that ‘all things works together for good’. I can understand that on a metaphysical level it is possible; however, the world we see with the body’s eyes is a battlefield.” – K.A. The world you see is always an interpretation. You see forms moving about and decide what they mean. In fact, a practice I learned was to sort out fact from my projection of meaning. For example, let’s say you see John shoot George. The facts is one body shot the other body. But, depending on the context, you may interpret that as good or bad. If it is during war and John is on your side and George is the enemy, you will probably see it as good. Or, if George is someone you judge as a “bad guy” you may also see it as good. Maybe John shot George in self-defense and you think it’s regrettable, but justified....

Ask: Do we receive abstract answers to linear problems from the Holy Spirit?

“ I have been staying Present a lot more, but recently saw myself bringing a problem in the illusion to the Truth to resolve rather than the Truth to illusion. Do the answers we receive from HS come in the world abstract for a linear problem? Is that how we can recognize it? Or how can we recognize HS’s answer for an action we need solved?” – MR In fact, you want to bring illusions to Truth rather than Truth to the illusion! To bring illusions to Truth is to correct the illusion. To attempt to bring Truth to the illusion is an attempt to “spiritualize” illusion—to make illusion Truth-like. “You have been told to ask the Holy Spirit for the answer to any specific problem, and that you will receive a specific answer if such is your need. You have also been told that there is only one problem and one answer. In prayer this is not contradictory. There are decisions to make here, and they must be made whether they be illusions or not. You cannot be asked to accept answers wh...

The Undoing Unfolds Through You

I’ve spent my entire adult life looking into this mind, so it was rather startling when things happened in it that I did not expect. How could I have missed that the self’s life was going to radically change? Looking back now I see shifts that occurred in this mind regarding the self (body/personality) that seem to have been preparation for this major shift. And I also see I missed them because I was not living through the self. I felt and watched the shifts, but I also let them go because I wasn’t living there anymore. I’ve written that in the four years between the ego (personal thought system) falling away and my acknowledging it, I experienced the Awareness of Truth (Holy Spirit) and therefore peace, but also a barren place in my mind. There was also a thread of pain that accompanied the barren feeling which grew as time went on. I now understand that the barren experience was the missing ego. It was what told me to identify with the self. Without it, I was simply experie...

Clarifying the Holy Relationship

As another Holy relationship has come into my life, several readers have mentioned that they thought the Holy relationship was with the Holy Spirit (Awareness of Truth in your mind) not with another. It is both. It is with another through the Holy Spirit. In A Course in Miracles , the Holy relationship, one of its chief teaching tools (along with the Holy Instant it expresses), is introduced in Chapter 17 (part V) in “The Healed Relationship”. From then on it never lets it go! And it is very clear throughout that it is referring to the relationship between Helen Schucman and Bill Thetford. “A relationship, undertaken by two individuals for their unholy purposes, suddenly has holiness for its goal.” (T-17.V.5) I have experienced the Holy relationship in two ways: mystical and practical. ACIM teaches both, but the labels are mine. The Holy relationship in the Text is clearly mystical. But in the supplement to ACIM, Psychotherapy: Purpose, Process and Practice, Helen and Bil...

Oops!

If you received a post called "The Fact of Spirit" in your email it was sent in error. This post was meant for October 31st and has been deleted so there will be no place to post any comments until then. Sorry for the error. Love and Peace,  Liz

About the Ego-identifier...

A few weeks ago I wrote about the ego-identifier (read it here ). It was the label I gave to the part of my mind that over-learned the ego (personal thought system). It was the last to let it go. It was the most resistant to it being gone. But I soon dropped the concept. It was useful while it lasted. I learned a lot about this mind. But after seeing into the deepest, darkest depths of its distrust of Truth (boy, that was uncomfortable!) and its valuing of guilt (as the ego taught it that guilt was the “proof” the ego was real), I realized I had no more use for the concept. If I continued to give it attention I would “recreate the beast (ego)”. A client of mine told me about another mentor of hers who dropped the ego. She described the stage afterward as the ego’s momentum winding down. It’s like when you stop peddling a bicycle, the bicycle continues to roll forward on its own until it comes to a full stop. I find this description better describes the wispiness of the remna...